


Shadow Games

by Artemis1000



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Banter, Crossover, Denial of Feelings, Diplomacy, M/M, Mind Games, Spies & Secret Agents
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-25
Updated: 2018-04-25
Packaged: 2019-03-26 01:26:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13847148
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Artemis1000/pseuds/Artemis1000
Summary: Cassian’s part in the game remained unvoiced: to pick out the truths from the lies, to discover when he was misdirected and take only what would be useful to him and not what would get him killed.Before the backdrop of talks between the Federation and New Republic, two spies weave their webs and catch one another.And then they catch feelings. Don't judge them. It happens to the best.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [olio](https://archiveofourown.org/users/olio/gifts).



> Playing fast and loose with smushing these canons into the same universe and same point in time so these two spies can meet - I hope you enjoy!

_Cardassians are predators_.

The warning was at the forefront of Cassian’s mind now, as he found himself faced with the amiable smile of a male Cardassian. He had approached him with no hesitation whatsoever and now he was standing by his nice little out-of-the-way table at Quark’s Bar, his distance perfectly measured so as to instill a sense of familiarity without crowding him, his smile unwavering in the face of Cassian’s annoyance.

“Forgive my forwardness but I couldn’t help notice one of our illustrious ambassadorial guests sitting all by himself and looking none the happier for it,” he said, his voice as charming and pleasant as Cassian had ever heard of any spy. “It would have been a crime not to try and do my part…”

“…for hospitality?” Cassian cut in,  his brows scrunched into the beginnings of a frown. It wouldn’t be much of an outward difference to the frown he had been giving his drink ever since he arrived at the far too bright and noisy cantina, yet this frown struck him as a matter of principle.

The Cardassian smiled genially. “Exactly! Guests from as far away as the New Republic remain a curiosity in spite of the wormhole. Every resident of Deep Space Nine should do their part to make them feel welcome.”

“A curiosity,” he repeated dryly. Yes, he certainly felt like one under the Cardassian’s intense regard.

 _Cardassians are predators_ , Cassian had been warned as he was prepared for this mission. _So are humans_ , he had told his instructor. Now, confronted with the man who struck him as strangely reptilian despite knowing better, he understood a little better what she had been trying to tell him. Maybe it wasn’t even so much that anything he said or did raised alarm bells. It was rather the lack of anything that raised alarm bells – an disquieting fact indeed when the information he had gathered since his arrival told Cassian that he had every reason to be alarmed.

He didn’t let his unease show in his body language, quite in the contrary, what he let show was just the slightest tilt of leaning towards him, a hint of unfurrowing of his brows. “I’ve been made to understand so are you. Being a Cardassian on Deep Space Nine, that is.”

The Cardassian’s smile never wavered. “I am but a simple tailor.”

Cassian took a sip of his drink, some Earth beverage called root beer which tasted awful if he were to be perfectly honest with himself. He had chosen it only because it was non-alcoholic.

Within the confines of his own mind, he went through all the interesting stories he had heard about Garak the tailor in the five days since Ambassador Vrelk’s delegation had arrived at Deep Space Nine to meet with Federation officials. They would have preferred to have the meeting on a Starfleet starbase but New Republic security had been quite firmly against that. Deep Space Nine, the gateway between the sections of space which the Federation called Alpha and Gamma Quadrant, was as close to neutral ground as they could come without actually involving a third party.

He put down his glass as slowly and deliberately as the Cardassian had sized him up. “So I have heard,” he said, his voice almost a perfect match to the tailor’s soothing tones – only almost, though, anything more than that would have been crass.

It was quite simple, really.

Cassian Andor knew that Garak, the sole Cardassian left on Deep Space Nine after the end of Bajor’s Cardassian occupation, had to be more than a tailor. Whether he was the Cardassian spy the rumor mill took him for or simply a meddler on his own behalf remained to be seen.

If Garak were indeed anyone worth of Cassian’s notice he, in turn, would deduce that at least one of the bodyguards accompanying the ambassador would be no bodyguard. That was not worth losing sleep over, any appropriately paranoid person would have come to the same conclusion. It was far more interesting that it had taken him five days to decide that he should spend his time on Cassian. Maybe Cassian had been playing his part too well, or maybe Cardassians simply liked to circle their prey first – time would tell.

“Have you?” Garak said as he sank into the chair across from Cassian. “I hope these colorful tales have not marred your opinion of me.”

Cassian permitted the corners of his mouth to twitch. “Colorful? More like lurid.” He switched on a charming smile of his own. “But I prefer to make my own opinions.” He reached across the table, offering a hand still calloused and scarred from a lifetime of war.

The Cardassian grasped it firmly. His hand was warm and softer than Cassian’s, his greyish alien skin tone standing out starkly against Cassian’s own, darker skin. His touch didn’t feel unpleasant.

“Sergeant Riccas Monbin.” He withdrew his hand and gestured at the uniform he wore. It was the uniform that had once been worn by Alderaan consular security, then adopted by so many rebel troopers, only to become once more the work clothes of diplomatic security in the New Republic. A black combat vest over a blue shirt, a pill-shaped white helmet.

There was a certain irony to it that Cassian had never worn this most distinctive Rebel Alliance uniform until the Rebel Alliance had ceased to exist.

Of course, for someone like him, the game hadn’t changed much but the stakes had changed a lot. During the war, Cassian had been involved in the nitty gritty footwork of espionage and sabotage and assassinations. He’d had the luxury of leaving galactic politics to the people who enjoyed them. These days were past.

There was a convenient beep of his comm. After giving it a cursory glance he rose to his feet. “It’s been a pleasure, Mister Garak. I hope we can talk again soon.”

The Cardassian’s chuckles rang in his ears long after Cassian had been swallowed up by the crowd on the Promenade.

 

The next evening, Cassian went to Quark’s early. He told himself he just wished to avoid the rush of people coming to lose their gold-plated latinum to rigged gambling and overpriced liquor, yet he knew the truth.

His encounter with Garak might have been the first truly interesting thing to happen since he had set foot on Deep Space Nine. After a long day of shadowing Ambassador Vrak Vrelk at mind-numbingly tedious pleasantries, he was eager both for interesting encounters and the reassurance of moving on familiar territory.

He had barely started on his root beer when Garak sat down across from him with the presumptuous ease of a long-time friend.

Cassian the man who valued his privacy and his personal space bubble would have had opinions on this. Sergeant Monbin, however, had a job to do.

He leaned forward, elbows propped up on the table. “Garak. I’d been hoping you would join me again.”

“Is that so, Sergeant?” The Cardassian’s eyes glinted with secretive amusement and for the life of him, he couldn’t decide if he was laughing with Cassian or at Cassian. “I just came by to ask if you’d like to join me in my store tomorrow, Garak’s Clothiers, right here on the Promenade. I’m sure I have something even to your people’s tastes.”

Cassian gave him an unimpressed look. Sergeant Monbin had a job to do but he also wasn’t stupid. Of course he would go if he had reason to believe something profitable would come out of it, but so far he hadn’t been given anything. All he had was the knowledge that any wrench thrown in the Federation’s budding friendship with the New Republic would be in the interest of the quadrant’s other powers, such as Cardassia.

“I’m afraid I’m busy tomorrow. Another day, maybe?”

“Sergeant, your suspicion commends you. It’s a rare trait among humans.” Garak’s eyes watched Cassian for every minute twitch and prickled on his skin, his regard reminded him distinctly of how a bug must feel captive under a microscope – or a spy captive in his interrogator’s net. “Did you consider I might have no ulterior motive? Perhaps I have simply never met a man in greater need of a tailor than you.”

Cassian snorted, he permitted his own gaze to narrow and some of his very distinct suspicion to bleed through. Just enough to show that he didn’t believe a word, not enough that he could be confronted with it. After all, there would be healthy limits to a simple bodyguard’s paranoia. “My uniform has a long and honorable history.”

Garak’s eyes slid over him. Slowly, _appreciatively_. “If you say so,” he demurred mildly.

Cassian could still feel his eyes on his body as if his gaze had been a physical caress. He suppressed a shiver. “I do.”

They had barely begun their dance for the night and Garak was already proving the most interesting puzzle he had encountered all day.

 

They talked of nothing – a task which Cassian usually wasn’t particularly good at, as he had neither the patience nor the inclination for small talk. He was far better at it when he slipped into the skin of a person more eloquent than himself, but that wasn’t even necessary tonight. Garak was eloquent enough for the both of them and he seemed to enjoy regaling Cassian with stories of the inhabitants of Deep Space Nine.

Early on during their evening, he had baited Cassian into a game. He would have Cassian pick out a person in the crowd and then he would tell him what he knew about them, or if he had no prior knowledge then what observation alone told him.

Cassian’s part in the game remained unvoiced: to pick out the truths from the lies, to discover when he was misdirected and take only what would be useful to him and not what would get him killed.

Garak’s voice was pitched to carry no farther than their table, his eyes rarely left Cassian for long and though he started out by calling this caution, as the evening proceeded he slowly came to realize that Garak was showing off for him. Or testing him. Or quite possibly both.

This realization left him more flush than the bright, colorful drinks which Garak ordered for him, insistent that he should know all the flavors of this quadrant and not just the cloying sweetness of earth.

As he made his way back to his quarters – alone – Cassian wondered if he _wanted_ Garak to be showing off for him.

 

It was two nights later that he decided the answer was yes.

“Kanar,” Garak said as glasses with a black liquid were placed in front of them, “a Cardassian specialty. It is an acquired taste to humans.”

Cassian picked up his glass and regarded the Cardassian’s greyish features, the elegance to his flaring neck ridges and the spoon-shaped crest on his forehead. He thought of how he had been warned of him; the Cardassian spy who had to be up to no good to be seeking out a New Republic guard. There was no saying if Garak, in turn, had been warned of him, too.

He swirled the liquid around in the glass.

If he were here as Cassian Andor it would bother him not to know. If he were here as Cassian Andor, it would madden him that he couldn’t tell how much of every lingering look and intimately pitched murmur was calculated to twist him into whatever shape Garak wanted him in.

But he wasn’t here as Cassian Andor and Riccas Monbin’s existence was just a wisp of an existence, nothing that needed to be sheltered and cared for; there could be no precious seed of trust or tender feelings to be destroyed.

He let sharpness bleed into his smile. “I prefer an acquired taste.”

Garak’s answering smile made heat curl low in Cassian’s belly. He leaned a little closer and pitched his own voice to match Garak’s for intimacy.

Tonight, Garak picked people out of the crowd for him. Cassian was not allowed to know enough about them to share interesting tales – he was, after all, in the guise of a simple bodyguard, and it would have been crude to drop this pretense altogether – so his challenge was another: he made up his tales on the spot while Garak tried his best to trip him up.

Cassian knew that he was showing off for Garak.

 

Garak took to touching him, something Cassian was unafraid to admit was a little bit more than he knew how to handle gracefully.

The first time he had been greeted by hands on his shoulders he had broken Garak’s right wrist before he even knew what he was doing, never mind having a chance to stop himself. The triumphant look in Garak’s eyes told him that he had been _allowed_ to do so. He suspected that he had failed the test.

There had been no more broken bones after that, which was fortunate since Doctor Bashir had been deeply upset.

“So you’re Garak’s new _friend_ ,” he had said, and added, all Starfleet moral disapproval, “I had assumed he would go for someone less ruffian. Aren’t you supposed to be protecting people from harm?”

Today, when there was a hand on his shoulder he still reached for it, but only to close his fingers around the Cardassian’s wrist and feel the blood pulsate under his fingertips.

It told him a lot about how far they had come. In some moments it made him wonder how much further they could come if they weren’t stuck with pretenses, or if Cassian’s time on Deep Space Nine weren’t rapidly approaching its end. He had been thinking a lot lately about how everyone said the things you regretted most were the things you hadn’t had the courage to do.

“Now, Riccas, we don’t want to be scandalizing my dear Doctor again, do we?”

Cassian’s eyes met and held Garak’s for a heartbeat, then for a second, for a third. His pulse was calmer than Cassian’s own and his skin felt hotter than any healthy human’s. Cassian licked his lips, a nervous tell he should be better than to permit, but he caught himself mid-motion and turned it into something deliberate.

For the first time, he could hear Garak’s breath hitch. All along, for the weeks in which he had been slowly, systematically tormenting himself, Cassian had never been able to tell if he had any effect on Garak at all.

The low, simmering heat that had been tormenting Cassian roared to a fire.

“I think maybe it _is_ time for me to look into a new suit.”

Garak was still for a moment before he inclined his head with all due grace as if he were really just an agreeable shopkeeper. “Come along then, Sergeant, let us not give your frugal side time to win out again. I will open just for you tonight.”

 

As the doors closed behind them Cassian braced himself for _something_ to happen, whatever it may be that would break the tension between them – even if it would be nothing but the most predictable of betrayals.

Instead, Garak went to one of the racks and started to go through the clothes lined up there, looking for all the world as if he was actually determined to sell Cassian a suit.

Cassian stood in the middle of the room, speechless, dumbfounded, caught somewhere between insulted, impressed and humiliatingly aroused.

He watched the Cardassian’s back, watched the movements of his hands as they smoothed over the fabric of shirts and pants, listened to the murmurs of his voice though nothing of what he said actually registered with him.

He understood. It was enough. Garak had pursued him but he would not pursue further.

He should have been infuriated to be pulled into yet another mind game when he was finally ready to surrender and call the games done. That he wasn’t, that was the truly infuriating part of it.

“Garak?”

He approached him, one hand on his shoulder, and as soon as the Cardassian turned around to him Cassian pressed his lips to Garak’s. His mouth was hot and dry, thin, hard lips that felt alien against his own but still so _infuriatingly_ good.

“Are you satisfied now?” he rasped when they broke apart, his brows knitted into another frown.

“I believe I will be, if all your kisses are like this one, _Sergeant_.”

There was still a hint of mockery to Garak’s voice, still the same detachment it had always held, something which Cassian thought he would have liked to chase and pick away at if they had the time for such things, or if he were willing to let Garak, in turn, pick away at his own detachment.

He didn’t, and they hadn’t, so he endeavored to show Garak the full array of his kisses and their miraculous ability to silence his snark.

 

Cassian left Deep Space Nine three days later.

They didn’t exchange frequencies as lovers would and he found himself oddly relieved for it. Not for lack of wanting to stay in touch, though he did think such sentimentality would be unsuited to them, simply because he didn’t like to mix business and pleasure. A comm frequency given to a one-time lover would only be used to cash in favors by people such as them. He would rather keep his memories untainted from wondering if there had ever been more to their talks than recruiting a new source.

It was easier like this. Simpler.

He had _forgotten_ some datasticks on the New Republic in Garak’s quarters which would make the time spent on him worthwhile – if Garak didn’t despair of decrypting them first, that was. Around the same time, some of Cassian’s other contacts had turned uncharacteristically talkative.

It was good enough. After all, they had pretenses to keep up and goodbyes suited neither of them any better than sentimentality did.


	2. Chapter 2

“I was hoping I would be able to buy a suit but rumor says the Federation is keeping you busy with other tasks these days,” Cassian said as he slipped onto the chair across from Garak as if no long years had passed since they last shared a table.

The Cardassian started, actually started as if he had truly been too caught up in his thoughts to notice Cassian’s approach, and he frowned. For a moment they simply looked at another and he felt his own resolve waver, felt himself on the verge of feeling abashed, wanted to make some excuse so he could flee and pretend this humiliating moment had never happened.

Maybe it had been silly to think he would be remembered at all. It had been nearly six years since they had parted ways forever. That equaled several complete lifetimes in their line of work.

Garak looked like a different man now, having the face of a man haunted by war and the things he had to see and do just like everyone else on Deep Space Nine did – it was a look Cassian remembered well from looking into the mirror, once upon a time, back when wartimes had been his reality. It was odd to see these eyes now in other faces and know they were no longer mirrored in his own.

“Riccas. Quark told me you asked for me on your last visit.”

Some of the tension bled out of Cassian, he hated himself a little that he felt relieved Garak remembered his fake name and even more than a little bit pleased that he sounded pleased to see him.

He nodded sharply, his face all business. “Yes. I was on Terok Nor for talks with Ambassador Weyoun. You weren’t here.”

“I was busy elsewhere.”

“So I heard.”

Around them, the hustle and bustle continued and cheers went up by the Dabo wheels.

Their table remained quiet.

Cassian looked down at his hands. He wasn’t here as Riccas Monbin this time, he wasn’t wearing the uniform of ambassadorial security. He should have felt more comfortable wearing his own skin, but wearing another man’s skin was another layer of protection. There would be no hiding now.

Maybe he shouldn’t have sought him out.

It was Garak who broke the silence first, striking up light-hearted small talk about the new drinks served at Quark’s these days.

They were both good at pretending that they were fine with not being able to gauge the other’s intentions.

 

“Cassian.” His voice sounded rough even to his own ears. He would have liked to say that it was just the afterglow but in truth, his stomach felt tight and a little sickly. It was always unnerving to expose yourself, especially when you did it out of choice and not need. “My name is Cassian Andor.”

They may not have known where they stood with another but after a drink and a second drink, he had gone home with Garak anyway. He had wanted to and it was so rarely that he permitted himself to do something simply because he wanted to.

In hindsight, Cassian realized, he should have started with a proper introduction.

Garak’s fingers were gentle in his hair. “Agent?”

“Commander.”

“Forgive me. I forgot that New Republic Intelligence uses military ranks.”

Cassian did not protest his assessment. Nor did he protest when Garak failed to pay him back in kind. He kept running his fingers through Cassian’s hair, so strangely gentle, and that was enough for now.

Since Garak hadn’t given him the kindness of a name Cassian didn’t volunteer the purpose of his third visit to Deep Space Nine. He would learn of it soon enough and like any spy worth his salt, Cassian knew he would be none too pleased.

 

“Observer? This is ridiculous,” Garak insisted once again as they left the war room. At least he was doing it only for Cassian’s benefit this time.

“Quite on the contrary. As an uninvolved party, the New Republic volunteered to send impartial observers to ensure no war crimes are taking place. While the Dominion has refused our offer, the Federation has accepted.”

“You weren’t being very impartial last night, Commander Andor.”

Cassian’s shoulders stiffened with indignation. It was a low blow. It was true, but that only made it all the more of a low blow. “Or I was simply observing from close by,” he sneered right back.

They stalked through the corridors of Deep Space Nine in icy, angry silence.

He had known Garak wouldn’t be pleased to have Cassian sniffing around his business and trying to dig up all the things he wished to keep hidden. If their roles were reversed, Cassian would now be wistfully contemplating murder. He wasn’t going to blame Garak for doing the same, he just hoped he wouldn’t go through with it. He did like his company and it would ruin the mood if he had to check his kanar for poison.

“They’re just going to send another one if I have an accident, you know,” he remarked.

“Don’t worry, _Commander_ , I take too much pride in my work to murder you at the height of passion,” Garak sniped back, “that would be gauche.”

“I feel so much better now,” Cassian scoffed.

He kind of did feel better, though.

 

Working with Garak, or at least in the vicinity of Garak, was completely different from the mind games they had played on Cassian’s first visit to Deep Space Nine.

Well, maybe it wasn’t completely different, the stakes were just higher and neither of them was willing to pull his punches.

Garak absolutely refused to give Cassian a straight answer on anything and though he could never prove it, he was convinced that he did absolutely everything in his power to make it near impossible for Cassian to do his job.

Cassian, in turn, made it his business to stick his nose into absolutely every business of Garak’s, whether it was war-related or not.

Truth be told, he kept waiting for Captain Sisko to be done with the nonsense and space them both.

Incidentally, Cassian had never been more attracted to anyone and if what he had heard of fierce arguing being a part of Cardassian courtship were true, he could only hope Garak felt the same.

Not that this kept them from arguing. Or him from trying to make Garak’s life difficult. Or Garak from somehow convincing all these dutiful Starfleet officers to be as obtuse as possible with him.

“I don’t think you’ve said a single honest thing to me yet since I returned to Deep Space Nine,” Cassian remarked one night while they had a drink at Quark’s and observed the behavior of the populace together.

Garak looked terribly flattered. “My dear Sergeant Monbin, you give yourself far too little credit.”

Cassian answered with an annoyed grunt and stuck to his kanar. At least that wasn’t speaking in riddles.

 

He learned only slowly and in pieces what exactly Garak did for Starfleet, decoding Cardassian messages for them and thus working in the war against his own people, for his people were now part of the Dominion and thus everyone’s enemy, even their own. He pieced it together more from the omissions than from what he was actually told and then that still left him wondering what else someone of his skills would be asked to do for them but one shameful secret was something to start with.

It was shameful to Garak, Cassian had worked with enough Imperials-turned-rebels to recognize the signs. He had never been able to empathize with their conflict but he had known it, and known to factor it into his calculations. Even when you knew that your people were in the wrong and had to be defeated, it still hurt to turn against the ones who used to be your comrades. It had to hurt even more to help aliens wage war against your own planet.

Once he knew of it, Cassian chose to pretend he didn’t know. It wasn’t even out of cruelty, though it would have been an effective cruelty to make him squirm and wonder how much longer until Cassian figured it out.

No, now that he knew of Garak’s work he could see the effect it was having on him and he wasn’t ready to deal with that. They would be entering dangerously truthful waters if that topic was brought up.

Just because they recognized a familiar darkness in the other didn’t mean they had to give names to such things and thus give them power. Sometimes it was enough to know that the other saw it, too.

It was easier to spend their evenings together arguing about Enigma novels – Garak had been delighted to learn that Cassian had kept reading them after his first visit to Deep Space Nine – and the ulterior motives of the people they observed.

Somewhere along the way speaking of others shifted to speaking of themselves, to mixing truths and lies and half-truths to soften the uglier truths, and to try to pick apart the other’s stories until they discovered the truths among the lies.

“Why did you sleep with me, though you knew me to be more than a tailor?” Garak asked one evening, making Cassian start at his uncharacteristic bluntness.

“Because I’d rather be told a lie I know to be one than to be left guessing, and waiting for the knife in the back,” Cassian responded, choosing to reward bluntness with bluntness.

“That’s charmingly Cardassian,” Garak told him and left Cassian guessing whether he should consider himself flattered or insulted.

They often left another guessing about a great many things. It was both frustrating and, yes, charming. Mostly it just raised Cassian’s hackles, but that was a given and delighted Garak more than anything else – which in turn delighted Cassian, but only secretly. He couldn’t let him have the satisfaction.

 

“Did it ever occur to you that what we believe to be truths could simply be particularly well-crafted lies?” Cassian remarked on another evening.

Garak gave him a fondly indulgent look. “But that's what keeps things interesting, wouldn’t you say?”

Cassian shot him a scowl but he basked in the prickle left in the wake of Garak’s eyes on him, let it seep under his skin into flesh and bones and fan the heat that always came with their verbal duels. Outwardly, of course, he couldn’t let any of that show. He notched up his scowl. “I think the word you are looking for is _irritating_.”

“No, that’s what Doctor Bashir calls us. Along with… I believe the word he used was _weird_. Yes, I’m certain he told me yesterday during our lunch that you and I are very weird together and _kind of creepy_. He said he is happy for us.”

Cassian didn’t know how he felt about there being a _them_ , it didn’t sound anything like the no-strings-attached deal he had signed up for. He still didn’t even know Garak’s full name – and he was too stubborn to dig it up himself, that would be like admitting defeat.

“I don’t know what my friends would say,” Cassian admitted. He’d never much thought about what they would think. There had been nothing to think about.

“I’m aware. Your friends are all dead.”

Cassian grimaced. “That’s not even remotely true.”

Garak looked very amused. “Do your friends know you lie about them?”

“Weren’t you the one who told me that all stories are true, even the lies?”

Garak chuckled. From his investigations, Cassian knew that since his return Garak’s mood was better than it had been ever since the war began, maybe in much longer even. It was another thing he couldn’t possibly admit out loud, yet secretly he let himself bask in the knowledge.

“I think my friends would call us irritating, too,” Cassian decided.

He didn’t think that would be a bad thing, not at all.


End file.
